Tag: licking

Birthday Cards

I check one last time to verify that all the ink is dry, and then, since it is dry, I strategically position and carefully slide the talking birthday card into its envelope.

Satisfied with what is left visible, I lick a few fingers and rub them to the bottom edge of the envelope flap, and seal the tip of the flap to the main part of the envelope.

Perfection.

Sure, I take extra care in positioning a card, but that is hardly the weird part of this never-changing process of mine… obviously, the weird bit is where I lick my fingers.

So, why do I do it?

Well, ever since George Costanza’s fiancée died from licking all of their wedding announcement envelopes, it’s just what I’ve done.

I went through a time where I always used a sink to wet my fingers, or even the envelope directly at times, but I usually am too lazy to take the trip and care required for that to go well.

Since seeing that episode, something within me has taken the extra-safe route, and has just forbidden me to lick envelopes anymore.

Perhaps I’ve done it a handful of times since that episode, but we’re talking an actual max of five times, here… in almost 13 years. 😛

I have told myself, on occasion, that I do the finger licking because I don’t want to get a paper cut on my tongue, licking the envelope…, but I know that is false, because I just did it more cautiously after that happened, and I mostly got over the concern – yes, that, too, is a benefit of not licking the envelopes, but it is merely a perquisite of my main intention of not being minutely poisoned by the glue.

And so, thanks to that absurd episode of Seinfeld, and my dad for being my ever-buddy in watching Seinfeld, I have been perhaps forever changed, and hopefully for the better, if not just the sillier. 😛

Post-a-day 2019

Tasty Ice and Salt

Do you know what a salt lamp is?  Well, I just realized that I have one.  And it’s in my room.  And I’m quite excited about it all of a sudden.  And, naturally, feel a silliness rising, too.  You see, with salt lamps, just like with ice sculptures, I have an urge to lick them whenever I see them illuminated.  Okay, the illuminated part isn’t exactly the same with ice sculptures, but the licking desire is.

I remember my brothers’ dad’s wedding over a decade ago (I think that was the occasion, anyway), and how there was an ice sculpture there at the reception.  My cousin commented how she wanted to lick it – perhaps it was a swan, if I remember correctly? – when we were standing in front of it.  ‘So, lick it,’ was approximately my response.

Sure enough, she licked it.  We both did, actually, because her desire rubbed off onto me somehow.  (It actually started a trend for me, for whenever parties have ice sculptures.  I remember shocking a few classmates, when I casually passed by and licked a huge ice sculpture at a school event.)  We were still kids, but we knew well enough that it was not a normal behavior, and so were stealthy about it.  But we totally licked the ice sculpture.

Now, I have a similar situation with salt lamps.  Though, since they aren’t something that will melt away in a matter of hours, and they’ll stick around for quite some time afterward, and have been around for a while, I don’t lick them.  Usually, though, I just touch it gently with a finger or two, and then smoothly lick the salt off my fingers.

Of course, now you know about my sneaky – and somewhat weird, really – habits at parties and salt-lamp-containing spaces.  Just don’t give me away, okay?  If anything, give the ice sculpture thing a go yourself.  It’s surprisingly rewarding, the whole affair.  ;D

Post-a-day 2018